IAIN DOWIE looked to put his own house in order before scrutinising his Coventry City players' performance at St Andrew's.

The Sky Blues boss has already admitted taking some responsibility for the 3-0 defeat by Birmingham City.

And he has been quick to take stock of his and his staff's contribution before dissecting the pros and cons on the pitch.

"As a collective group, me and my staff had a meeting on Tuesday morning about what we could have done better last week and what we did differently to the week before," said the manager.

"There are some things that jump out and there are some things we need to polish up, so as a staff we look inwardly first and look at what we can do better.

"So we will get ourselves in order, although we have not done a massive amount wrong, and then make sure everything is right for the players because they have got to take responsibility for their performance on the field, but we do it together."

He added: "I was looking forward to seeing how the boys came in and I'm expecting a reaction in training as well as on Saturday.

"They have been in good form of late because if you win four, draw two and lose one that's almost Championship form.

"We have set ourselves standards so I don't accept that it is a blip because if you are going to be a winning team you have to have that mentality all the time.

"If you get a group of players who, inwardly, drive themselves on, I think that's what you strive for and that's the ultimate scenario.

"You have got to have that.

"Do I expect them to get together and sort it out?

"Yes, and they are a group of players who have got belief among them and we have got to keep that.

"Having said that, the ugly bits of the game, which we have been doing brilliantly, we didn't do so well.

"And they are the things you can control."

He added: "I can't wait for Saturday and I wish we were playing QPR tomorrow because we need that game to come round so that we can exorcise a few demons.

"But we should still be full of confidence because even in the Birmingham game, we had some great chances.

"We probably had six outstanding chances from corners - free headers, shots in front of goal, two shots from six yards out and we didn't hit the target with any of them.

"So from a positive point of view, our set piece delivery was very good."